A moving account in words and pictures of a doctor at work in Gaza. This book is a medical doctor’s account of what he witnessed in Gaza in the summer of 2014. It is the photo story you will not see on television or in the newspapers. On July 7, 2014, Israel launched a series of aerial attacks on Gaza, followed by the ground phase of the operation ten days later. Mads Gilbert arrived in Gaza on July 13th, and worked day and night for the next two weeks at Al-Shifa Hospital, dealing with casualties, repairing serious injuries, and trying to save lives. With the help of a small, black camera ready in the pocket of his green operating scrubs, he was able to document some of the human cost paid by the Palestinian people for enduring the Israeli occupation. He also kept a daily journal about the situation, with eye-witness accounts of the havoc wreaked by the Israeli attacks, and moving accounts of his interactions with ordinary Palestinians—men, women and children—who had done nothing to deserve the horrific disruption to their lives. What Gilbert experienced was awful, and it was immense—the sounds of bombs and screaming, bodies torn to pieces and a society reduced to rubble—but he also saw camaraderie, dignity, human courage and unflinching resolve.
Mads Gilbert is a medical doctor at the University Hospital of North Norway. He received his PhD at the University of Iowa and is a specialist in anesthesiology. He served as a leader of the Emergency Medicine Department of the University of Troms. Since 1981, he has been going regularly to Palestine as a teacher and emergency care doctor in Palestinian hospitals on behalf of UNWRA, the UN aid agency to Palestinian refugees. Over the last few years he has worked in Gaza during successive waves of Israeli attacks on the densely populated area under siege. He is co-author (with Erik Fosse) of Eyes in Gaza, which was hailed by the influential Norwegian newspaper Klassekampen as the “Best Book of 2009.”
